18 Months

New birth. New life.
So free of pain
Such sweet absence of color
So pure, so white

A young woman, with no foundation.
Blame her upbringing, she is much too complacent.
Not yet fit for life, let alone a son.
So this had to be rectified, undone.

Only she didn’t expect to love him this much.
To miss his touch.
His 3AM cries for attention
and his overall presence and existence.

He is the first boy, after all.
He is her treasure.

The thoughts crash against each other destructively inside her head
They don’t make it any better
They don’t make it easier giving up her treasure
The first boy and her everlasting joy but ..

Not the last.

No, the newest addition is cooking in the oven.
While his father spent time juggling soap,
Another baby? It’s all so sudden.
How else could she cope?

This isn’t the first seed either, the first boy is number two.
That would make the newest one, number three.
First one, a girl, popped out at sixteen.
Every girl’s worst dream.

A mother of three by 21.
Just another statistic

She isn’t dumb.
Perhaps just a bit too foolish.
Maybe this obsessive desire for love is hereditary.
Damn … that’s heavy.

Then she arrived at his grandmother’s house.

I can see her face now.
Tear streaks barely visible on her newly red cheeks.
The blood rising to a perfect height to illustrate
The amount of gall it would take,

To do what she is about to do.

Small talk is a means to an end.
Making sure Grandma wouldn’t know.
Carefully hiding her pain and shame,
Ensuring it would never show.

“You know, mama pat. I’m out of diapers.
I had been meaning to stop and get some.”

Then she rose from the couch in a hurry and, I imagine, she stared at her son.

One sole tear falling down her face,
Before Grandma could turn around.
She is gone without a trace,
Free and far away now.

So he sits there on the couch in his car seat,
Sleeping. Essence white as an angel’s skin with a pure soul.
Unlike his mother, devoid of any pain or shame
At this age, he doesn’t even know his name

Or …

The fact that he’s only eighteen months old.